April 17, 2017

When Trump turns on the enemy within — the Fed

So the first one hundred days of Donald Trump have nearly passed and there seems to be a sense that, despite all his initial maverick positions, the country feels like it’s under a typical Republican President.

Russia is again the enemy number one; intervention in the Middle East is ongoing with the usual American “regime change” objective; and NATO, which was said to be obsolete a few weeks ago, is now an indispensable ally. At home, talk of the much more pleasant tax cuts has replaced the most extreme rhetoric of scrapping Obamacare and even corporate America and Wall Street — both implacable enemies during the campaign, now look set to be left alone.

So, normal service has been resumed. Or has it?

I don’t think so.

I believe that there is one massive populist battle coming up. It has not been picked up on, but it will be a struggle for the heart and soul of the US economy pitting the democratic White House against the technocratic Federal Reserve.

One enduring campaign objective remains and it is to “Make America Great Again”. This doesn’t mean firing rockets from ships into foreign countries, it means making the people who voted for Trump feel a bit richer by the time the next election comes around. The next election is the congressional election in September 2018 — which, in the world of politics, is not far off.

These congressional elections are really a referendum on the Presidency. They are one of the checks and balances of the US system. For Trump’s Republicans to win in sixteen months’ time, they have to make good on the election promise to make the average guy richer or at least feel richer.

People feel richer when (a) the economy grows and (b) the fruits of this growth are evenly spread. The problem in the US is the very force that drove Trump into the White House: the fruits of US growth are not spread evenly. The wealthy do so much better and the very wealthy do ridiculously well, while the average guy falls backwards. In the US, it is estimated that 50% of the population live paycheck to paycheck.

Trump told these people that he would make them more secure, more valued and a little bit richer.

But the only way he can do this quickly is to actually put money in their pockets. This means giving them jobs quickly, raising government spending very soon to expand programmes that employ people directly and giving tax cuts away right now. All these initiatives would increase the American government deficit immediately.

The alternative to all this would be for the Trump administration to follow the Obama administration and further cut interest rates. But rates are already low, and although cutting rates eventually causes incomes to rise because people borrow more over time, this all takes a long time. And Trump doesn’t have time. That’s the one thing he doesn’t have much of.

So how does a President engineer an electoral boom over the short term?

Well what he does is he tries to boost the economy immediately.

This is where the battle with the Federal Reserve comes in.

The Trump White House is on record as saying it thinks that the US economy can grow at between 3 and 4% per annum. If it was to grow that quickly, unemployment, which is now at 5%, would fall to close to 3% and the wages of those in work would rise too. This would make the average guy feel richer and would go some way to ensure that the Trump Presidency keeps its electoral promise to the average dude.

But the Federal Reserve believes that the US economy is already at full throttle at a rate of 2% and any further growth would simply lead to higher wages and prices. Traditionally, the Fed doesn’t tolerate rising inflation. So the thinking is that the Fed will raise interest rates (and it has already done so on one recent occasion) to choke off inflation and the higher interest rates would also choke off the White House’s desire to get the economy growing at 4%. This would extinguish Trump’s chances of getting re-elected.

Therefore, over the next few months, Trump will be thinking that the main obstacle to re-election is not the Democratic Party, but the Federal Reserve. The Fed becomes the enemy within. If he can bully the Fed into tolerating a higher growth rate, closer to his desired 4% rather than their stated 2%, he can deliver for his people.

Now here comes the politics of the situation.

Up to now the American economic community and the financial markets have assumed that the Fed will win this battle with the White House. The working assumption is that the White House always backed down in the face of the all-powerful Fed. But is this true of the Trump White House, populated by people like Steve Bannon, who see the world as a battle between the people and the elites?

There is no more explicit example of the technocratic elites than the Federal Reserve, populated as it is by academic, doctorate-holding, ivory tower economists. This is the ultimate expression of an unelected power base. On the other side of this battle you have the democratically elected Presidency, elected by the average guy to stand up for the average guy.

What happens if Trump bullies the Fed into accepting his higher growth rates which he achieves by boosting government spending and borrowing billions? Could it happen in the first place?

Yes it could. In the 1970s, Richard Nixon bullied the Fed into printing money so that he could win the 1972 election. It can happen because it has happened. This would mean that all the old rules go out the window. American wages would rise much quicker than they have in the past few decades. The average guy will feel richer and then he will be persuaded to vote for Trump again. Wall Street would wobble and the stock market fall, but the vast majority of people don’t own stocks, so they won’t care. And Trump will get his re-election and the only people who will squeal in the short term are rich bankers and investors on CNBC.

Sounds logical? That’s because it is. The Fed gets put in its technocratic place, the White House spins it as a victory for democracy over technocracy, and the Democratic Party is robbed of its electoral clothes.

From a Trumpian perspective, what’s not to love? That’s exactly why it’s likely.

What about our enemy within? Those damn whistleblowers.
At least the media did their part to black out coverage of Jonathan Sugarman’s appearance at the Finance Committee – pass on my thanks to the SBP & indo editors!

Very telling how little coverage this has received in the Irish ‘media’!

Understandable maybe, as people were preoccupied by the far more important issue of €140 water bills…

- Mr Sugarman, who was risk manager in UniCredit, has claimed that prompt action in 2007 might have avoided the need for a blanket guarantee and bailout of the Irish banks.
- He said his life has been “utterly destroyed because I did the right thing, but the people who did nothing got off absolutely scot-free.”
- “I have been unable to work for ten years and have been unemployable for upholding the law of Irish Republic.”

To be honest, given the location of debt in the US system, and the pervasive lying that is at the heart of consumerism (you can afford it, even if you do not really need it, except to impress people who have not found out how inadequate you feel about yourself, when everybody else is buying equivalent junk), it has reached the point that this is the only option for the system.

The danger is that the money will not end up resting in the account, to use the Irish political terminology.

Household debt in the US is unsustainable. And the cost of living of many items has now become beyond the reach of most people. Of course, US education itself is now an exercise in branding, and in extending clique mentality. The America of earlier decades, with it’s sense of opportunity has now died a slow death, stiffled of it’s life by the ivy league education sector.

Small wonder that there is now open aversion to the elite. The elite have been despising the rest of decades. America invented a cast system for itself, that was the very antithesis of
- The American Revolution
- The Civil War
- The mid 20th century politics that was built on restrained social mores, and that forced both corporate and public bodies to at least aspire towards being of service to those that wanted to work hard, and achieve.

Trump’s capitulation to the Washington Imperial machine, might saved Trump’s life. JFK did not capitulate, and ended up being a CIA target, in an internal coup. JFK was on so many medications he probably was not going to live much longer anyway. But if he had avoided Vietnam, that would have saved America an awful lot of misery, and debt. Vietnam had second and third order effects that are stilly wrecking America, even today.

The entire emphasis of American exceptionalism has been redirected to sell a policy making complex to the populace, when it was apparent to many that it was of no service to that populace.

When the populace rebelled against the system, that has been defined as “populism”.

It is obvious in debt charts, and other measures that the American populace was being shafted for years. With the most apparent evidence of all being the state of US cities. Especially cities run by the ‘machine’.

We have been told for decades that the 70s show was failure. In effect what you see in present day Detroit and Baltimore is a bigger failure. But it is a failure that is the other side of the coin of the success of Wall Street and Silicon Valley. Neither of which produces any value close to their valuation level. The success of both has been to program voters to go along with their own decline, whilst expecting matters to change, as the soundbites have changed.

Much of American society is in a sorry state. And many other Western countries are on a trajectory that is close behind. Ireland is very close behind. Ireland is another political machine run country, with the machine broken into factions so as create the pretence of choice.

The illusion of choice. You can have any politician you want, as long as he takes no instructions from voters. He/She can feel the voters pain. But should that politician try to take the bias out of the system, then expect paid protestors, activists, and all round trouble makers to show up to voice discontent on the streets. And expect serial careerists within the permanent government to wreck any moves towards opening up government decision making to populists interests.

Democracy has been killed by television. It happened decades ago. And we never noticed. It is only when we are post television that we might get to see what really happened.

[
unemployment, which is now at 5%, would fall to close to 3% and the wages of those in work would rise too.
]

Not according to John Walter Williams. Official US unemployment statistics are highly misleading. The labour force participation rate is frightening.

The US unemployment statistic is about as useful as the IRL GDP statistic, or the EU bank stress test results. In other words, it is designed to misrepresent, even before any measurements occur.

One may as well be back in 1999, reading the prospectus of a Central Californian tech trailblazer which relies on non-GAAP earnings.

In the short term there are serious debt bubbles in many Western countries. All that is preventing these from collapsing is endless (unsustainable) low interest rates.

Interest rates are a mechanism for controlling risk management. The low rates in recent years have already caused many episodes of risk mismanagement. With resulting debt bubbles emerging all over the place. And these have hidden serious competitive and other weaknesses in the US economy.

Trump’s plan to get the jobs north of the Rio Grande, is not so easy to settle. Apart from cost, the Mexican workforce is quite capable, of performing, even at higher costs or tariff levels. It will not always happen.

So, even if Trump does the aforementioned, the result will be to bring people back into the labour force, to prevent immediate inflationary effects.

The real question is what will any of this do for America’s bubble addicted economy. The nature of the US economy, is the problem. It has become one massive casino, operating out of New York, not Las Vegas.

Can Trump wean America off ponzi-economics ?

And if he does, are there any lessons for an even more ponzi-economic bound Irish economy, with it’s own massive casino in the IFSC, and busted gambler outfits – those two ‘pillar’ banks.

We are in a different economic era, and Trump is a pressure release valve. The economic policies of the Ahern/Blair/Clinton/Bush years have caused nothing but financial disaster, and debt bubbles that collapse.

The current fetish on statism, is an attempt to sustain this leverage through public sector excess in the place of private sector excess.

But the core problem is still there. The excess.

And this is where politics enters the picture. Too many interests, and individuals are in power in the West today, to allow an acceptable of life without excess. There are too many people on the credit drug. The entire cutlure, and it’s consumerism, are too highly strung. And that is simply something that will not be culturally unwound, until an absolute disaster occurs.

This is why war is so attractive. It is like an alternative towards coming down off the credit drug. It offers a new addiction, with the option of even more central control of the populace. And this is why the American voters avoided Clinton. She could tell that Clinton was the more willing to start more wars. The problem is that Trump MUST indicate a willingness to start wars, for the sake of his own power within the system.

We are in trouble, because we have become a prisoner to too many illusions in Western civilization. What started off as Bernayism, became exceptionalism, and has now descending into all out intellectual dishonesty.

The mountain of intellectual dishonesty has become another of the great bubbles of the current era. The one that feeds and inflates the others possibly. And those that have their careers invested in it, have not intention of seeing it deflated.

Hence the entire backlash against Trump, and the eagerness to support him when he starts making mistakes like siding with the petro-economy funders of the ponzi-scheme.

Because so many are addicted to an overleverage economy. Consumerism changes the entire motivation of society, where behaviour is programmed to ends that are deeply dysfunctional and actually extremely destructive.

Wesolych Swiat Wielkanocnych! (Beannachtaí na Cásca oraibh!)
Good, substantive article (similar to one of the previous articles that posited that with mega-high interest rates, FED sabotaged President Reagan in the early 80s, but that it might be different with President Trump). Here is a thing though David didn’t consider – FED’s dependence on other central banks in maintaining the value of the dollar as reserve currency (I’m not talking here about the petrodollar, because that is yet another thing). Here is what I mean by that: so far, FED would have stifled the threat from other currencies by convincing other powers to out-print the dollar (Japan, EU, Switzerland and China – the latter doing it voluntarily). This was possible thanks to many factors, but a crucial one was that hitherto, these political organisms shared similar ideology on one hand, and geopolitical orientation on the other hand. This is not the case now – gone are cordial meetings of President Obama and Tsarin Merkel, and with the global trend to close tax loopholes and abandon banking secrecy, Switzerland’s propensity to take measures against Swiss franc appreciation might diminish.

Furthermore, since Chancellor Schroeder (on Gazprom’s paylist), Germany’s (the ruler of the euro) geopolitical orientation U-turned from Atlantic to Eurasian, while – contrary to what most commentators in the world predicted (and in keeping with what I predicted – based on my analysis as well as real, first hand information from Candidate Trump’s meeting with the Polish diaspora), President Trump’s geopolitical orientation is anti-Eurasian and pro-Atlantic. Nothing exemplifies this reversal more than President Trump’s demanding from Tsarin Merkel to pay $300bn Germany owes them for military protection after WWII (unlike the UK, Greece or Poland, NATO’s membership was not a financial commitment for Germany, but a netto gain – of 0.25% of their GDP year by year – and this does not include technology transfers).

All of that means that while FED might indeed cooperate or cave in to President Trump as Mr McWilliams predicts, other countries – whom FED needs to sustain the dollar – might not, because their political visions differ much more from Mr Trump’s vision than they differed from President Obama’s. This would mean that if, say, Madame Le Pen wins and euro collapses (mind you we are talking about a candidate that has much less clue about the economy than Mr Trump has, and – what is far more important – Madame Le Pen’s advisers have much less clue about the economy that Mr Trump’s), and if Germany returns to Deutsche Mark and abandons QE, and FED keeps low interest rates and QE – then the dollar will tank, and FED won’t be a b l e to keep purchasing Treasury bonds and mortgage backed derivatives to the tune of $1tn a year, in order to keep their prices high – regardless if they will cooperate with Mr Trump or sabotage him.

If other countries revolt, FED interest rates would have to be much higher – perhaps even 1980s high – and values on the banks’ balance sheets would be much lower. On the other hand, would the collapse of the US stock market not help to diminish inequality in the US that David is writing about? Because, who benefits from the US stock market the most? – in a pre-bailout era, it used to be whoever was smart and willing to take a risk – but, henceforth, it is the insiders (who, the less risk they have to take thanks to bailouts, are getting more and more stupid and disconnected from reality). So who would benefit the most from the stock market collapse? Provided that there is no more bailouts and QE, ordinary people would benefit the most by financial capital moving from stock market speculation and property speculation to investment in factories and SME’s – “creative destruction”, as Joseph Schumpeter called it.

After all, if FED won’t be able to purchase stocks in order to support equity prices, what is the point of having a stock market? Investing in it would make as little sense as that eejit Seán Dunne (dubbed the “baron of Ballsbridge”) investment in Walford house on Shrewsbury Road for €58m, thus setting a new record for the world’s most expensive house (per square foot) – only to sell it later for €15m (“moron of Ballsbridge” would be so appropriate – I’m sorry, but if someone is so stupid that he couldn’t see that “Walford” was massively overvalued, he should be denied a credit card, let alone a mega-million bank loan). Btw, the “moron of Ballsbridge” commented on the news that his creditors might only receive as little as 2% of what he owes to them, looking forward to the prospect of being debt-free in 6 months after filing for Chapter 7 in Connecticut (and yet the Irish State chases the hoi polloi for some stupid TV license?!): “I can always say to anyone that we did our best and came up short but now we move on”. No, that’s not true – the best he could do (if he had any honour at all, which he doesn’t – btw, incidentally I know from people who served him that unlike some readers here, the greedy “moron of Ballsbridge” rarely tipped) is to either repent for the rest of his life – giving up his nice gaff in Connecticut and working physically for the poor, or to commit suicide, as a dark warning for future greedy and stupid property speculators; after the 1929 crash, people who wasted millions of other peoples savings actually had some shame, and many of them committed suicide – not because they were chased or so poor that they had nowhere to live, no – they just simply could no longer live with such shame; same with officers or generals who betrayed or escaped from the battlefield.

P.S. Last week I wrote: “If someone in AerLingus reads it: please restore flights to Kraków!” A few days later, Ryanair launched a new campaign, of which I was informed by an e-mail from them. It says: “We’ll always have Krakow” :-)

Interesting that you should mention politicians that do not have the ability to run the economy. In the last decade we have been presented with the narrative that statism is the solution, across the EU. The results indicate that it is not.

What happens when those who are poised to be hit by creative destruction, have access to the corridors of power ? They achieve bailouts with the bill being sent to society. This is core EU / ECB policy.

Ireland consented through it’s garrison like political options. So did Greece – though the Greeks at least admitted that more debts is NOT the answer. The Irish establishmnet decided that more debt is the answer.

Iceland was even more honest than Greece. It observed that the EU was itself flawed, to be proposing an unworkable approach as the solution.

We are living in the shadow of decisions made by Irish statists, in the shadow of EU superstate builders, to implement a solution that is built on low interest rates, credit addiction, a flawed concept of economic efficiency (let’s make the economy efficient by levying it at every possible opportunity), and debt.

So also is Spain. And this will be the case in the Scandinavia economies within 5 years.

In fact, I reckon this model will be the norm in most Eurozone countries.

“In fact, I reckon this model will be the norm in most Eurozone countries.”

It may and it may not. I’d be inclined to say that it will not because the interest of the core of the EU, roughly covering the former Carolingian Empire + Spain + Italy, has diverged to much from the interest of countries on Europe’s peripheries.

The tragedy of Italy is that as Germany, Italy didn’t exist as a state before 19th century, and when it came into existence, it is now ruled by the sloppy and Byzantine middle channeling money into mafias in the south to sustain unity; all of that financed by industrious and innovative North; the tragedy of Germany is that is also didn’t exist as a state until 19th century, then it was unified by totalitarian and Byzantine Prussia:

then it had a great post-WWII period of Atlanticism, and since the capital of Germany (and thus capital of Europe) moved back to Berlin, Germany and thus Europe is reverting to Byzantinism again, on the verge of becoming an even worse Turanian (chipping of people, etc):

A quick food for your thought: who are the officials of the lower and middle levels in Berlin? Why, former STASI people and their children.

To exemplify it with two examples (I could name many).

1. In which countries interest is to have tax harmonisation for companies? Germany, France, Spain. Not Estonia, Poland, Ireland, Finland.

2. In which countries interest is to have trade routes going west-east (this is how the EU funds are distributed: to have it going this way and not another, from gas pipelines to motorways and river routes)?
Germany, Netherlands. Not Ireland, UK, Scandinavia, Visegrad Group – these countries would have been better off carrying out trade from the Black Sea and Mediterranean via Baltic to the Atlantic).

The tragedy of Spain is that they failed to understand why they lost their empire. This was the topic of David McWilliams’ best article ever:

1. The Carolingian Europe will dominate the rest, and the rest will live “in the shadow of EU superstate builders, to implement a solution that is built on low interest rates, credit addiction, a flawed concept of economic efficiency (let’s make the economy efficient by levying it at every possible opportunity), and debt.” –

btw, few people know that even though Poland does not have euro currency, yet it is obliged to buy Frankfurt’s euro-bonds, more or less to the tune of EU subsidies it receives directly, which subsidies then return to Germany and France indirectly, with interest. As Poland has in its constitution that national debt cannot exceed 60% of GDP, this is paid by very high income taxes on labour (technically, the marginal rates are not high, but there are no tax credits).

2. Or with President Trump, there will be a Trans-Atlantic axle UK-Poland, and that would dominate the Carolingian Europe.

3. Or EU will split into two EU’s – Carolingian and peripheral.

Or the biggest latent volcano in Europe, Laacher See volcano, will erupt and our discussion will be academic:
I know someone who was there last year and saw that water in the lake was gurgling… (I wonder if this was the real reason why the German government told people last year to store food and have all documents and deeds with them all the time)?

Regarding tipping (when I mentioned Dunne – no Mr necessary in the front of that eejit’s name) – this the late-shift bartenders from Carlow I know that from. I am not sure if within 2-3 years of their work they would meet him then and again, they saw more than 10 euro from him in total, for all that time – for what was a continuous drinking of the likes of him until late hours of the morning.

Btw, this statistics says is all:

Oireland:
“The average rate for a Bartender in Dublin, Dublin is €9.81 per hour. People in this job generally don’t have more than 20 years’ experience. Pay for this job does not change much by experience, with the most experienced earning only a bit more than the least.”

And they are expected to pay TV license from that to finance Ms Finucane’s lazy journalism and opulent lifestyle, and 150 euro for their monthly bus tickets if they work in Dublin? As opposed to 30 euro they would pay in San Fransisco with that income?

US:
“A starting bartender should average around $230.00 a night, or about $23/hour for a full ten hour shift.”

Remember all these stories of US actors who started as bartenders? In Dublin, they would have started a n d stayed bartenders (some of them would have ended up prostitutes or drug dealers) – forget money for acting classes: 6 nights of stressful work of a Dublin bartender would be an equivalent for 2 days of less stressful work of the New York bartender – and instead of bumping into witty and eloquent Francis Ford Coppola, they’d only bump into drunk Sean Dunne. Remember that incredibly stupid film “Coctail” with Tom Cruise? If it was set in Dublin, not only he would have lost his smile – having earned less than half of his money – but also, he would have ended up with a blue eye for talking too much and not being quick enough (and heaven forfend if anyone in Ireland refused to serve a drink to anyone because he looks too drunk).

Yet

Ireland, on paper, is a country with a GDP per capita similar to the US, and inequality is, on paper, bigger in the US. In fact, few things irritate me more than people saying that Ireland is poor. Ireland does not suffer from lack of money, it suffers from channeling that money into things like Walford, and the hoi polloi facing the offer they cannot refuse of financing this speculating madness via rip-off prices (of rent, of food, of medicine, of everything apart from valuable work).

But even bigger problem is the prevailing mentality that everything still has to be that way. It doesn’t. Don’t get me wrong, in many ways Ireland is a hub of innovation – but this is thanks to the presence of US IT multinationals (Dublin Bus is not a benchmark for innovation or common sense). How many people who say that nothing can be changed re-elect the same parties (the difference between FF/FG-lers saying that nothing can be changed and Sinn Feiners saying that nothing can be changed is that the former say nothing can be changed because Ireland is too small and everyone knows everyone, and the latter say that nothing can be changed because of the mythical 800 years)?

This whole debate is based on the false premise that the statistics used are close to correct and are valid.
Unemployment rates, cost of living calculations, income calculations and statements of growth in the economy are all manipulated for political purposes and practically speaking bear no relevance to the average citizen.
Inflation rates are artificially subdued by the manipulation of facts and pricing. Employment rates are reduced by manipulation and calculation of the relevant statistics. In short all is a fabrication, a deceit, a lie, a fraud.

Anyone using these statistics is adding to the fraud. The system is corrupted and so are the practitioners, and more so those who should know better than to constantly repeat this garbage while hiding behind phony credentials.

Growth rates in the economy are reported without adjustment for inflation. As in this article growth is confused with inflation and vice versa. The net effect is that the vast majority are deluded into thinking the economy is better than it really is. This includes the economists and financial commentators who are too lazy to do proper analysis but who use the proffered statistics unquestionably.

The fly over belt that voted for Trump can feel the reality of this deception even if they cannot define the problem. They know they work hard but that income refuses to meet expenditure. They know the inflation rate is a lie and that costs are rising, quality declining, and volume of goods reducing. They read of “full employment ” yet cannot find a well paying job.

It is not just the working population that is shorted, the retired population is too, as well as all the rest on social benefits. More than 50% of the US population are net beneficiaries of government largess.

Low interest rates lower the value of working capital as money is so cheap it is economic to replace people with capital intensive plant and equipment that replace labour in the factory. Labour is retained in places or moves to places where the cost of labour is low.
Low interest rates reduce income for the retired. One cannot live as well on a 6-8% interest rate income as one can at 2-3%. Pension plans are being hollowed out and forced to invest in speculative products.
The statement that few invest in the stock market is untrue as funds for pensions are now heavily into stocks trying to make up the shortfall in interest income in bonds and the risks of buying into a radically inflated bond market.

The central bankers are in the thick of the manipulation. The major lie is that the recovery is well entrenched, inflation is low and Economic growth is solid.

If the reported growth is in the 2.5-3% range and the inflation rate under 2% then the real economy is expanding at a 1-1.5% growth rate.

However if the inflation rate is closer to the unreported rate of 6-8% Then actual growth is in fact negative. A negative 3-5%. This is not negative growth but a rapidly contracting economy that will be 50% of the current level within 15 years. My personal calculations tell me that my standard of living is 45% of what it was in 1970. The rate of decline is accelerating from the 1-2% range to a recent 7% per annum.

Trump has not a hope in hell on delivering on any of his promises unless he closes the federal reserve and at the same time stages a coup e’tat. He will need to control the armed forces and homeland security and destroy the CIA. In short become a dictator. Whether he would be benevolent would remain to be seen.

“Since we keep detailed records of expenses (a necessity if you’re a self-employed free-lance writer), I can track the real-world inflation of the Burrito Index with great accuracy. The cost of a regular burrito from our local taco truck has gone up from $2.50 in 2001 to $5 in 2010 to $6.50 in 2016.

That’s a $160% increase since 2001; 15 years in which the official inflation rate reports that what $1 bought in 2001 can supposedly be bought with $1.35 today. This enormous loss of purchasing power is not reflected in the official measure of inflation, which claims inflation is subdued (1% or so annually).

If the Burrito Index had tracked official inflation, the burrito at our truck should cost $3.38 — up only 35% from 2001. Compare that to today’s actual cost of $6.50 — almost double what it “should cost” according to official inflation calculations”

“Bogus government statistics, fake news and manipulated markets are intensifying to the extent that I believe even (George) Orwell would be dazzled…

This indicates to me that the authorities believe that they can’t allow a correction to get underway because it could easily snowball into a panic in view of the historical overvaluation, weakening economy, and a deteriorating profit picture.

Compounding the problem is the condition of pension funds in North America, which despite ludicrously overpriced stock and real estate markets and unsustainably low interest rates, are seriously underfunded. If those three primary asset classes were to decline significantly from current levels, there would be a pension crisis the likes of which has never been seen before.

Government Reporting Lies As The Economy Implodes
Switching to the U.S. economy, most of the micro numbers I’m looking at do not at all support the numbers the government is reporting. Retail sales, which are an extremely important component of the U.S. economy, are week. And the carnage in the bricks and mortar retail sector is alarming. Stores are closing everywhere. Auto sales, which were greatly inflated by subprime auto lending, have clearly peaked and inventories are building. Virtually everything is suggesting we are entering a recessionary period, if we aren’t already in it.

Gold and silver are historic stores of value and are remarkably inexpensive in the face of a financial asset inflation which has elevated stocks, bonds, and real estate, to ultimately unsustainable level prices. A wise investor would be continuing to diversify into the precious metals as well as the high-quality companies that extract them from the ground.”

The ‘enemy within’.
Are the very people you have referred to.
Any individual or group calling for more state intervention is the enemy.
We need less state intervention (or more efficient state intervention at no extra cost) and more balancing of the books.
You can have the other without the one.

“I do not know enough about the US FR to know if it is the problem. Compared to the ECB is the paragon of competence. That much is obvious. New England is not punishing Hawaii with pompous nonsense.”

The FR was planned and formulated by the European banking fraternity lead by the Rothschild representative Paul Warburg.
He was ably assisted in implementation by Senator Aldridge who had close Rothschild connections. Most current central banks of most countries follow the similar format.

The difference between the Fed and the ECB is that the former controls the currency of one country while the ECB controls the singular currency used by a score of disparate nations all pretending to be the same but who in reality are not.

The EU and the ECB are a preview of the style and scope of how a one world government would work if imposed upon the world.
It would result in greater and greater centralization until dictatorship was achieved and overseen by a huge bureaucracy.

This is the death of the planet and civilization.

The central bankers must be defeated before anything else can be accomplished.

Israel-Cyprus-Turkey pipeline would provide new strategic triangle, says former US Ambassador Bryza

ALI ÜNAL
@ali_unal
ANKARA

Published October 2, 2016

EXCERPT

Israel-Cyprus-Turkey pipeline would provide new strategic triangle, says former US Ambassador Bryza
The former Deputy Secretary of State and U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan, Matthew Bryza, said the solution of Cyprus’s problem would provide the most economically attractive export route for Cypriot natural gas as well as for the Israel-Cyprus-Turkey pipeline, which also can elevate Turkey’s strategic importance and secure its economic benefits by becoming an energy transit hub

The former Deputy Secretary of State and U.S. Ambassador to Azerbaijan Matthew Bryza said it is incorrect to say that the price drop in natural gas makes it economically infeasible to transport Leviathan gas to Turkey and added his hope that gas export from the Leviathan field would start in 2019. A former senior diplomat Bryza currently serve as a board member of Turcas Petroleum which is the leading Turkish energy investment holding that created Turkey- Israel natural gas pipeline project. Answering to Daily Sabah’s questions on pipeline politics Bryza said that thus far, energy reserves have had a minimal impact on regional states’ relations. Underlining that if the Cyprus problem solved Turkey would provide the most economically attractive export route for Cypriot natural gas Bryza added that in this case an Israel-Cyprus-Turkey pipeline, would also provide a powerful mechanism for building a new strategic triangle among Turkey, Cyprus, and Israel.

Commenting on the TANAP project he said that when the Southern Corridor reaches its full capacity its economic and geopolitical significance for both Turkey and the EU will be much larger and he said that then this project will become a serious alternative to Russian gas. Regarding the KRG gas Bryza asserted that eventually, and inevitably, KRG gas will reach Turkey while drawing attention to the current obstacles to the project that poses by Daish, the PKK and other terror organizations in the region.

Answering to question whether Turkey can become an energy hub that determines the petroleum and natural gas prices he said that Turkey can elevate its strategic importance and secure economic benefits by becoming an energy transit hub, thanks to the several pipelines. Bryza said provided that Turkey advances its longstanding plans to liberalize its natural gas market, Turkey can also become a trading hub for natural gas, however he drew attention that It is unlikely that Turkey could become a trading hub for petroleum, given that oil prices are more or less determined globally rather than at individual trading hubs.

Following the normalization of relations between Turkey and Israel, a possible natural gas pipeline project to carry Israeli gas to the European market via Turkey has come to the fore. Could you provide some information on the latest developments regarding this project? When do you think Israeli gas would arrive in Turkey?

Several companies in both Turkey and Israel have been exploring the commercial possibility of such a pipeline since the discovery of Israel’s giant Leviathan natural gas field in 2010. Initially, the progress was slow given the breakdown in Turkish-Israeli relations as a result of the Mavi Marmara incident. Interest grew, however, with Prime Minister Netanyahu’s apology to then-Prime Minister Erdo?an in March 2013. TURCAS energy in Turkey subsequently played a leading role in assembling a consortium of potential Turkish buyers of Leviathan gas, which might also include major European companies. These efforts stalled throughout much of 2015 due to a difficult political debate in Israel about the regulatory regime that would govern Israel’s natural gas sector. With those regulatory questions now answered and with the normalization of Israel-Turkey relations, it is now possible to reinvigorate efforts to develop an Israel-Turkey natural gas pipeline. Prime Minister Netanyahu has made clear that Turkey provides Israel’s preferred export route for its natural gas, while President Erdo?an has said such a pipeline could and should play a central role in the further improvement of Turkey-Israel relations. It is now time for the companies and countries to get back to work.

The private companies developing the Leviathan field Nobel Energy from the U.S. and Delek from Israel, hope to begin their gas exports in 2019.

MC, I am sure it is apparent to you that “Pravda”/RTE has the definite objective of preventing the people from finding out that which the people need to find out, about the way things operate in Ireland.

Much of what goes on is a useless safety valve for emotional outflow, and manipulation.

Don’t worry about the drugs on your street, concentrate on athletes taking drugs in sport instead.

If RTE was useful they would shut it down. No need to shut something down, when it is an effective mechanism for control.

Having read this article and all of your posts it’s hard to see who’s right and who’s wrong.
That is a worrying state of affairs.
It indicates a chaotic point is becoming more likely.
Ok tell us something new I hear you all say.
What is new is the sense (for me) or feeling that the day of reckoning is coming into focus rather than tomorrow always tomorrow.
Based on 2008 events then September could be a very bad month in the existence of humanity.

Meanwhile, amidst all the doom, gloom and moral compasses lost in the labyrinth of shattered hopes , this is, without a doubt, some good news that we can all (even Mr Kenny at at Cruinniú na Cásca – dancing like a butterfly, stinging like a bee) heave a sigh of relief at:

The Brits are completely remodelling their entire system, whilst our amatuers are fiddling around with non-adjustable tools, trying to sort of the ballcork, for the water supply.

We STILL have NO BREXIT PLAN.

We are STILL waiting for instructions from the morons in Brussels, and the hapless, disaster prone Merkel.

The EU is a mechanism where we have outsourced responsibility for running our affairs to Brussels. The quango institutional state hsa grown as compliance is far more important now that flexibility.

Another question in relation to Irish politics – how does Greater Manchester manage to run it’s affairs without 1000 plus quangoes, semi-quangos, and various non-public bodies in receipt of taxpayers money.

Our system is FAR TOO COMPLEX TOO WORK.

Our debt is out of control.

Our statistics are a mirage.

And our publci governance has become an effective prevention method for any adjustment of the market to market demand – resulting in all sorts of ridiculous inefficiencies, bottlenecks, extortion rackets (fully regulated to make sure there is no escape from the scelping) and protected sectors.

.
[ Victor ] Rothschild helped neutralize enemies of the Soviet Union who came to the British for support.

For example,

he was involved in the cover-up of the assassination of Polish war leader and British ally Wladyslaw Sikorski, whose plane was blown up in July 1944.
Sikorski had become burdensome to Stalin after he discovered the KGB had massacred 16,000 Polish officers in the Katyn Woods and elsewhere in 1940.”

Although I posted this hastily translated excerpt from recently reprinted memoirs of Hipolit Korwin-Milewski (b.1848-d.1932, aristocrat, politician, writer, very rich and patriotic man – he built a theatre in Vilnius from his own money – I cannot imagine the likes of Sean Dunne not only spending 50 million on building a theatre for his native Carlow, but even him donating 10,000 euro to National Theatre of Ireland in Dublin), I might as well repost it again:

“A few days after the armistice on 11 November 1918 Ksawery Orlowski was visited by Baron Maurice de Rothschild, worldly ambitious MP known to him, and not without a certain ceremony he said that he is visiting him as a prominent member of the Polish diaspora with a warning, which may have for his, Orlowski, homeland, great importance. Personally, Mr. Rothschild, “remembering that until the end of the eighteenth century, Poland was Europe’s most tolerant Jewish state, had wanted the Jewish question altogether not to be discussed at the Congress”, but

“left to Warsaw to discuss between citizens of both faiths, Jewish and Christians, which are able to reach agreement. But this view is not generally accepted among Israel. Among Christians, there is a perception that the whole Jewry throughout the world is at absolutely solidarity and politically marches as one man. This is a big mistake: because there are a number of issues on which there is great divergence between the Jews; eg. in the social and economic issues, he, Rothschild Jew, and Mr. Leib Trotsky – also a Jew – are going in completely opposite directions.

But there is one point on which virtually all the nation of Israel to the last man absolutely solidarity, namely when it comes to Israel’s honour.

If the official representative of the Polish Republic at the Congress will (without naming names) be “from the city of Warsaw, a member of the Russian State’s Duma” (Roman Dmowski – G.K.), who gained worldwide fame as a virulent anti-Semite

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////
(no, he didn’t gain worldwide fame for that – he gained worldwide fame for outspeaking PM Lloyd George at the Congress of Versaille, a man who was as dim as he was nasty: Lloyd George famously said that at the Congress – in the tradition of Olivier Crowmwell and John Dee – that to give Poland Silesia means to give an ape a watch – but he had to eat a humble pie when it turned out that Boy Lloyd George has confused Silesia with a region Silecia in Turkey, and thought that the Poles want a part of Turkey: but you wouldn’t find the latter in any British history book; Lloyd Boy George also confused the forme Austrian occupation zone Galicja with Galicia region in Spain – how did he become a PM, I don’t know)

coming back to Hipolit Korwin-Milewski’s account of his conversation with Mr Rotschild:
///////////////////////////////////////////////////////

, then all Israel and Mr. Rothschild himself will be considering the nomination as a slap in the face the whole of their nation and shall proceed accordingly.

Count Orlowski should know that the Jewish influence on the decision of the Congress of the peace are very great. Let them know in advance and warn them that if Poland is officially represented by this man, that Israel will be on her way toward all of her goals, and they are known to us.

You will find us on the road to Gdansk, on the way to the Prussian Silesia and Cieszyn, on the way to Lviv, on the road to Vilnius and on the way all of your financial projects. May Count know that and shall he act accordingly.”

Rotschilds never sued or distanced themselves from that account of Baron Rotschild’s Versaille negotiations with the Polish delegation, so I reckon Milewski didn’t make it up – besides, people were more honourable before WWII and they would not have fabricated or distorted quotes with such ease as people do today, in every country – all thanks to the tradition of duels, at that time especially strong in Poland, some parts of Germany (particularly Heidelberg), Spain, etc.

Exhaustive 13 page study on the role of honour in Polish history (not to be confused with Poland of today, peppered with hundred of thousands of former communist agents and their children, many originating directly from Soviet military – for whom the notion of honour is as empty as a notion of snow for a Somalian):

The really fascinating article (it is more about the old national mentality – like I said, largely gone after 70 years of negative selection of elites (btw, Ireland’s plights also started after the Flight of the Earls – no healthy nationalism, no healthy state can arise without healthy national elites) than about technicalities of duels) ends up with a fast-forward to 21 century:

“Nor could Boziewicz necessarily take heart from representative Zbigniew Kozak’s January 18, 2011, criticism of Premier Donald Tusk for his handling of the Smolensk air disaster investigation.

“Are you and your ministers familiar with W?adys?aw Boziewicz’s The Polish Code of Honor?” the deputy asks rhetorically. It is questionable whether Boziewicz would have approved the honorable challenge of a duly elected public official earnestly performing his offices, as long as such performance did not “bring out facts concerning the private lives of individuals ,” as he stipulates. However, it is also doubtful whether any parliamentarian of any other twenty-first-century nation would close a speech by using honor and a dueling manual as his final argument. This incident from less than two years ago suggests how deeply the need for honorable satisfaction still resides in the Polish national consciousness.”

““Are you and your ministers familiar with W?adys?aw Boziewicz’s The Polish Code of Honor?” – the tragedy of Poland is that they are not. Donald Tusk as early as in 1988 said in an opinion poll for a Catholic monthly “Znak” on what Polishness means to him:

“Polishness means abnormality. It is something that has to be overcome”.

thus signalling that he is putting himself on the market as a cute hoore, to be hired by whoever pays most.

It is perhaps as early as 1988 when the life paths of Mr Tusk and Ms Merkel crossed (as it is well known, in 2005 accused by Jaroslaw Kaczynski of being a former STASI agent – one statement which launched a giant and ongoing media campaign in Germany, interestingly – in all newspapers, from far left to the right).

Yes – this is probably the key, the key to many, many things, such as why as recently as this week, the former Tusk minister has run down the most profitable and high-tech Polish mine of the best quality coal in Europe (anthracite) by forcing it to finance the non-profitable mines sponged by former commies, and this week the Dutch ING bank (oh the Dutch – masters in pulling someone’s chestnuts out of the fire – only them can give the British good competition in political cunningness: example – how skillfully they first monopolised grain trade exchange in 17th century then Polish Gdansk, only later to monopolise that trade and undercut the somewhat naive Polish traders, with an additional argument of having a powerful navy) has REFUSED to sell the allegedly “loses-making” mine to the citizens of the town where the mine is located, whereupon the coal mine was taken over by the bank, a l l miners were sacked, and… as early as the next day German state representatives WITH their security were seen in the mine protecting it from who knows what exactly.

And BND started to merge with STASI as early the early 1980s (there is this joke that everyone thinks West Germany annexed East Germany, but in fact East Germany annexed West Germany).

Operativgruppe Warschau, Operativgruppe des MfS in der VR Polen, w skrócie OG Warschau. Established on September 8, 1980, in cooperation with gen. Kiszczak, who gave it powers bigger than to KGB (KGB could not recruit from communist party’s top echelon, STASI could).
First Commander: Karl-Heinz Herbrich

All available in German archives, but no book publish in Polish about it (only a few articles).
For example:
Jens Gieseke (opr.): Wer war wer im Ministerium für Staatssicherheit Kurzbiographien des MfS-Leitungspersonals 1950 bis 1989, BStU Berlin 2012, 88 s.

Last Commander of OG Warschau (up to 1990 – they operated legally in “free” Poland!): Carl-Heinz Scharpegge, planted in Poland as early as 1960 (graduated from Polish literature and psychology in Poland).

Number of active agents – up to 500 (we still do not know who most of them were/are).

Location of their headquarters in Poland: crazy as it sounds – the exact location of… Gestapo headquarters in occupied Warsaw.

And if anyone is hasty enough to think that this is some sort of conspiracy theory, just look at the size of their headquarters in Warsaw (they had slighly smaller buildings in other towns):

What’s there today? Interestingly, the government centre for new legislation…

P.S. When Frau Merkel arrived in Poland last year for talks with Jaroslaw Kaczynski, she met him, Polish PM and the opposition leaders. Nothing wrong with that, until we find out that… she met the opposition leaders in the German embassy. German embassy is located perhaps 200 metres from the Parliament. How convenient!

Interesting point about honour enforced by duels. I sometimes ask myself what happened to it, it seemed so different to what we have now. I think of Dumas, of course, and Daniel O’Connell, who famously killed a man in a duel. I seem to recall various references to duelling Polish counts over the course of my reading.

When it comes to honour being enforced by duels, it also influenced the way people referred to each other in the past: it was much more polite, partly because it was considered to be appropriate, partly because of a risk being challenged to a duel. For example, when I look at Polish pre-WWII movies and contemporary movies, there is a colossal difference – even we allow for pre-WWII movies being censored and idealising the reality. Same with the difference, say, Shirley Temple spoke in her movies and the overagigated, rude and narcissistic characters played by current child actors, such as in Hannah Montana (incredible as it sounds, a bunch of 12 year old girls visiting my friends house actually thought that Hannah Montana was a real person – in the past, children were on the one hand less sexualised than they are now, but on the other hand, much less naive – in 1980s countryside Poland, 12 year kids would have often driven tractors through villages on their own! – such was their level of maturity; and nowadays, give a 12 year old a bicycle, and he would likely bump into a pedestrian).

In my primary school, we had fist duels almost every week, but it was unthinkable that a crowd of aggressive kids would attack one person – even though kids were, in general, more aggressive. Now the opposite is the case – teenagers are much more cowardly in general, but nearly all youth attacks you read about on the British Isles are on the lines: 20 teenagers attacked 1 man and kicked him to death, etc.
All in all, a lot of that comes from their boredom and children not being allowed/encouraged to work – and of course, from the mother being absent (or single and absent).

Another impact of the lack of duelling is the inability of most so called intellectuals to engage in a proper debate, by which I mean a debate in which one person talks and another person listen to him of her without interruption and impassionately (I myself am guilty of that sin, because of another feature of our times: inability to formulate questions in a coherent way – even debates at TCD or UCD are full of people who just talk about themselves and hurl moral judgments, rather than on the issue).

When the President of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins, called his opponent a wanker in a loud, squeaky voice because he was unable to handle his arguments, then what hope is there for less privileged people to be able to engage in a polite conversation? In the past, a duel would have solved that issue instantenously: Mr Graham would have said to Mr Higgins – “tomorrow at 6am, weapons of your choice, or otherwise noone will shake your hand, let you in to a posh restaurant ever again, and people would leave the room that you are in – you’ll be persona non grata” – that’s what someone would have said in the past (I cannot remember though if there were some limitations on age in duelling in Boziewicz’s code – there might have been; interesting aspect of that tradition was that not everyone was considered worthy of duelling – some people didn’t have “honouric capacity” and you couldn’t duel with them, because that would have debased you.

The humorous aspect of that particular feud is that Mr Farage said he didn’t have a sword, and Prince Zylinsky was willing to… buy him a sword.

Things I have noticed people don’t do nowadays:

1) Young people holding doors in cafes – in summer, I sometimes do some work in cafes (with headphones) and at least 95% of people, and 100% children, lack proper upbringing – sometimes there won’t be even one person for the entire day who would close the doors after himself or herself, let alone hold it for someone
2) Dublin Bus drivers – the vast majority does not wait for people running (this is unacceptable behaviour for a bus driver in Poland).
3) People sitting close someone who reads a book in an half-empty bus/train and yapping loud on mobile phones for an hour – this I think is unique to Ireland, as it is some cow driving 50/h per hour on M5 with 2km gap in the front of him/her, and holding the entire motorway in ransom (amazingly, noone uses the horn- people much prefer to be late at work by half an hour).

But

People in England say please and thank you like 100 times more often than in central and eastern Europe (this is changing with the young generation), and in Ireland they say more often still.

But these are but small details, albeit reflecting souls. The main issue is the lack of emotional control, and I blame pop-culture for that – in most films, actors are even more rude than hoi polloi

In my limited understanding duelling was for gentlemen only. It survived surprisingly late into modern times. In England the sporting idea of ‘fair play’ was still fairly strong in my youth. Foreign footballers often failed to live up to those ideals, as did foreign referees and linesmen. Alf Ramsey (manager of the 1966 World Cup winning English team) famously described a violent Argentinian team of the 60s as ‘animals’. Jurgen Klinsman, a German, was the first player to introduce systematic diving into matches – nearly everyone does it now.

The refusal or inability of intellectuals to debate fairly is dreadful, and as you say it wasn’t always so. They are carried away by emotion.

I have some reservations about politeness as etiquette is sometimes used as an excuse to berate others, but it is essential of course. And old friend in England was very polite and capable of extreme rudeness. I find the Poles here are more formal and polite in their dealings with each other. (I would be offended if a Frenchman were to address me as ‘tu’.)

Closing doors behind you is a sign of consideration to others but I don’t like the obsession with holding doors open for others as this has become almost a religious obligation (I am tempted to stop and pretend to fumble in my pockets if I see someone ten yards ahead impatiently holding a door open for me). Those yacking on phones while I am reading are pests as are people on buses who won’t move in to let you sit down properly.

I was walking home from work last year and a European walking behind me told me off because I was weaving in and out and he couldn’t get past! Usually I walk fast and nobody needs to overtake me. I can’t remember what I said but it was direct and to the point.

I remember holidaying in Normandy twenty years ago. In the countryside people would always shake hands before speaking. My wife was berated by a shopkeeper for holding the freezer door open while she hesitated over which ice cream to buy. On the boat home from Cherbourg there was a visible sigh of relief from the returning travellers when the coast of Ireland appeared. There would be no more polite queueing than God. We drove to Liseux one day and stopped in a café or restaurant where the highly-strung waitress got nervously vexed (in that European way) when we didn’t sit in the right place, perhaps I had a plastic bag on the table in front of me, or whatever. (Armenian by the look of it – immigrants are often more intolerant of offences against etiquette, probably a way of ingratiating themselves.) A local man ostentatiously observed us, ironically. I glared at him until he looked away. And don’t get me started on the continental insistence that you wait in your seat until the waiter condescends to bring you your bill!

On the other hand there was (and probably still is) a big difference between English and Irish pubs. In England you wait at the counter, like a supplicant, until the incompetent and slow landlord or barman gets round to your order (satirized by Harry Enfield) while in Ireland it would be ‘sure wait there and I’ll bring them over to you’.

The s a m e man who passed off to Stalin that on September 12, 1939, France and Britain decided not to honour their military agreement with Poland – whereupon on September 17, the Soviet Union attacked Poland from the east…

I glanced at the Wiki link. I was amazed to read that Philby gave advance warning to Stalin of Barbarossa (ignored) and the Japanese attack on Singapore rather than on USSR (acted upon and led to vital transfer of seasoned troops from the eastern front to turn back the German advance).

I am reading, and listening to, a lot of the Spanish historian Pia Moa at the moment. Franco has clearly been grossly misrepresented.

The item I am starting to focus on is the US debt ceiling debate. Will congress up the limit or cause a problem for the administration to run out of money to operate government. If the latter we could all live on government credit briefly but then what.

There is some speculation that Trump wants to take out the FED. But how? Perhaps if there is a stand off “Trump will be forced in the National Interest”, to issue Treasury Notes to pay the running of government.((These notes will be produced from nothing just as is the Fed note. The difference is that it is not a bank note, it is not a loan and there is no interest, therefore there will be no increase in the national debt by issuing treasury notes.). Maybe these bills will be backed by gold, Trump having an affinity for gold. Russia, China and other nations will then do the same as all currencies are devalued, in extremis, to the ounce of gold. $5000, 10,000 or 50,000 an ounce for a federal note may be the rate, BUT the Treasury note may be less.

As executive government would have passed a law in emergency it will be de facto before the banksters know what is happening. (Goldman and JP Morgan will be ahead of the back with inside knowledge. ) Then it would be harder to assassinate to correct the change as it would not be reliant on the president but the whole presidential cabinet.

Anybody holding Federal reserve notes as cash or cash assets will be wiped out. Only hard assets would be left, and treasury notes. We would effectively be back on a gold standard as all currencies will be measured by how much can be obtained for an ounce of gold. Silver will be left to float as well. Silver will then be used for coin again.

There will be initial chaos but people have to eat and trade will quickly resume, based on the new rules. The Fed note would initially be used for trade and people would get rid of them ASAP. Treasury notes would be held for savings and final settlement of purchase in larger transactions. Soon the fed notes would be worthless and the national debt would be expunged by paying off the devalued FED notes with revalued Treasury notes.

The Federal reserve would be rendered obsolete,Trumped one might say, the national debt gone, the budget balanced, and the amount of currency in circulation be regulated by gold in savings.

Probability or possibility? We wait to see. Truly , America would be Great Again.

“Thinking ahead, this could solve two pressing problems: the first is to persuade Congress to sanction an increase in the deficit limit, it always being easier to persuade Congress to finance a government at war, and the second is to attract the necessary dollar-denominated capital to buy Treasury debt, without having to increase interest rates. ”

The state has turned into a parasitic racket, that promises many things, and always delivers short.

There are functions that can only be delivered by the state. These are the natural monopolies.

But there are a lot of functions that can be delivered by private individuals.

And a lot of functions that are inefficient when delivered by the state. For example Dun Laoighaire Port. Either close it down and hand it over to the OPW for redesign as an amenity, or hand it to Dublin Port as a overflow mechanism.

And there are a lot of services that could be outsourced on public tender, within defined parameters – with defined remits.

David,

Please write an article on the Port of Dun Laoighaire as an example of what is going on in the Irish state, and which survived the squeeze, and has been uncorrected.

There is a case to stop having Dun Laoighaire as a ferry port, and just running it as a yachting centre, or for amenity purposes, for Dublin.

The quango in charge is killing the opportunity for something better.

And please do not have it handed over the the Harry Crosbie / Bill Cullen set. No way, Jose.

Food for thought as to why the economists of today cannot solve our economic problems. They are Mal-educated.

The Fundamental Flaw of ‘Mainstream Economics’
Hugo Salinas Price
Francis Bacon, an Englishman, was born in 1561 and died in 1626.
Bacon’s thinking had a profound influence upon the development of Western civilization, because he founded what is known as the scientific method. All the scientific advances of mankind up to the present day, are based on this method, which is – in a few words – controlled experimentation upon things of the natural (physical) world in order to arrive at a truth. He was the first to outline the bases of the methodology to discover physical truths.
In contrast to his way of approaching reality, we have the example of alchemy, the forerunner of chemistry. For the alchemist, there was not a clear separation between the physical and the spiritual properties of matter. Thus, the alchemist was typically fascinated by the possibility of manipulating the spiritual properties of metals, in order to transmute a metal of very low value, such as lead, into the metal of highest possible value, gold. Infinite riches would be the prize for discovering that method. The processes were mysterious and thought to be hidden in codes provided by earlier alchemists. Even the great physicist, Sir Isaac Newton (1642 -1726) still dabbled in alchemy, while doing his enormous work in astronomy.
Logicians tell us that the process of arriving at a truth through prior experimentation is inductive reasoning, where the mind is led into the truth through experiment. If you put a fresh egg into boiling water for, say, 12 minutes, your egg will be a hard-boiled egg. Repeat this experiment as many times as you want, and you have a physical law: “Fresh egg boiled for 12 minutes produces hard-boiled egg.” Such is Physics. The truth expressed by the aforementioned Law is arrived at through induction.
The huge and unquestioned successes which the world has enjoyed through the application of the scientific method founded by Francis Bacon have led to an overvaluation of the scientific method and to its abuse. For while this method is the correct method for the investigation of the natural world and knowledge of its characteristics, both down to the sub-atomic level and up to the level of knowing what the landscape of Pluto looks like, it is not the only scientific method of acquiring knowledge.
The other method of acquiring scientific knowledge is not based on prior experimentation and is not based on induction.
I do not know what to call this alternative method of acquiring scientific knowledge – perhaps an indication of the more humble position which it enjoys, in our highly materialistic world.
However, there exist examples of this alternative method of acquiring scientific knowledge: One of them is Logic and another is Mathematics.
Logic is not born of experience and experimentation. It is inborn in the human being. Where Bacon’s scientific method reveals truths a posteriori, that is to say, after experimentation, Logic is a priori – inborn in us, and exists in us before experience. The same holds for Mathematics: the science of number is independent of prior experience.
The truths derived from Logic and from Mathematics are a priori, and all further truths arrived at in Logic and in Mathematics are arrived at by an intellectual process which is different from that applied in Bacon’s scientific method: they are arrived at by deduction, and not by induction.
There is a third field in which scientific knowledge is obtained through deduction. I refer to Economics. Economics is the study of the Logic of Human Action. It is an a priori science, whose postulates are arrived at through a deductive process from the initial a priori truth – a truth within each human being – that human beings act; from which we deduce that human beings choose, from which we deduce that the human being prefers one thing to another. From which I deduce that the reader is preferring to read this article rather than doing something else with his time. And so on and so forth.
Thus Economics is the study of conscious human behavior.
Such is the hold which Bacon’s scientific method for the study of the natural world exerts upon mankind, that in our day all “mainstream economists” are trained to study human events through the methodology of induction, which is by its nature based on experiment. This is highly unfortunate, for induction through experiment is logically inapplicable in the field of human events, because controlled experiment, the foundation of Bacon’s scientific method, is impossible when studying how humans behave. Atoms have no choice, they must always behave in the same manner under similar conditions. Planets have no choice, they follow their orbits without fail. On the other hand, human choice, whether individual or collective, varies from instant to instant. You, the reader, have the choice to continue reading, or not, for instance.
All true Economics is based on an undeniable fact: humans act, from which we deduce another undeniable fact: humans choose . True Economics applies a different methodology – the methodology of deduction – to the study of human affairs; this methodology is radically different from the methodology which is appropriate for the study of the natural world.
All the present woes, uncertainty, unjustified speculation and enrichment of a few to the detriment of whole nations, the utter madness of ZIRP and now NIRP, the call for the banning of cash, and so on and so forth, all the anomalies which now plague our world are due to the false methodology upon which “mainstream economics” operates.
The High Priests of the Fed and the ECB, of the Central Banks of China, of Russia, of the whole world in fact, are doing nothing more than experimenting upon mankind. They are “Sorcerer’s Apprentices” and attempt one policy after another, hoping that the next experiment will provide the success they wish for. They are all looking at numbers, at graphs, at percentages of change, at trend-lines, at the results of prior experiments in past years, attempting to derive some knowledge of what they must do. But a posteriori information is useless – it only can show what happened in the past, and not what they desperately need: scientific certainty of what they must do now to achieve the ends which they seek.
“Mainstream Economics” functions on the basis of an inappropriate method. The inductive method cannot apply in the realm of human affairs, where each situation, individual or collective, is unique and not repeatable; no matter how well-intentioned “mainstream economists” may be, their methodology – induction – must fail to solve the problems they face.
In order to de-throne these impostors, it would seem advisable to undercut their presumptuous airs with the argument that they really do not know what they are doing, because they are basing their policies on the wrong methodology and cannot possible achieve any success. This argument attacks the very foundation upon which “Mainstream Economics” has built its castle.
The most influential and prestigious universities of the world, such as Stanford, Princeton, Yale, Harvard, MIT, and the London School of Economics, are all training would-be economists in the wrong methodology:
in the scientific method which is applicable to the natural world, induction through experimentation, which is, however, utterly useless and counter-productive when applied in the realm of human behavior, where only deduction from a priori knowledge, as taught by the New Austrian School of Economics, is the correct methodology. All we can expect from these young men and women who will graduate from their studies as “accredited economists” will have to be further chaos and disorder, and further breakdown of prosperity, which will end in the complete impoverishment of humanity.
For more on this subject and the misguided efforts of “Mainstream Economics” I refer to you Ludwig von Mises’ fascinating book, “Epístemological Problems of Economics” and to the work of Professor Antal E. Fekete, founder of the New Austrian School of Economics, whose work can be found at http://www.professorfekete.com.

“What a farewell to virtue. Dr. Paul warned the Fed and Treasury that the IMF was “forbidding countries suffering from an erratic monetary policy” from adopting precisely “the most effective means of stabilizing their currency.”

Such a policy, he warned, “could delay a country’s recovery from an economic crisis and retard economic growth.” That could further the very economic and political instability the IMF supposedly was against. Yet Dr. Paul never received an answer.”

If David McWilliams humbled himself enough to think logically in matters Economics he would be an “Austrian” Economist / Jewish Economist ;
Ref. “Austrian” Economics is also known as “Jewish” Economics

What a pity he was not a Jewish economist when then Minister for Finance Mr. Brian Lenihan visited him at his home for get advice from “the outsiders’ favorite economist” on what to do about the private debt of the Irish based private banks.
On that meeting, David “the mainstream economist” strongly advised the useless Minister for Finance to get the Irish State to guarantee / sovereignize the private debt of the Irish based private banks.

Further note ;

Gifted & highly accomplished writer that David is, Hugo Salinas Price, as an Economist & Thinker & Writer, is — in Jimmy Magee terms with regard to Diego Maradona versus the best of England in World Cup 1986 — “different class”.

SUPERB MISSIVE BY HSP above.
And, it following a theme of HSP found in other articles of his,
vis.
Economics is NOT similar to Physics ;
Because :
Physics relies on Experimental Method mainly.
“True” / “Proper” / “Austrian” / “Jewish” Economics relies on Logic only.

On 19 April 1764 the British Parliament forbade the American colonies to print any more paper money. Odd as it sounds because they had been printing paper money since about 1690 with uniformly ruinous consequences, the colonies resented this prohibition. It became one of the grievances culminating in the American Revolution. It would take another 25 years ruinous experience, and the catastrophic collapse of the Continental currency, to convince the die-hard friends of paper money.

From reading those comments, I think I have identified a core problem that exists both in the US and in IRL.

The politicization of the entire state itself to the point that the state is no longer even remotely functional to those that are not involved in the political gangs.

In America both parties are responsible for wrecking so much of what is a truly great and creative society, turning it into a shambles of chicannery, deceit, and underperformance.

They have both got long lists of destruction to their names.

The anti-GOP candidate won the GOP nomination.

The ant-Democratic party insider candidate had to be sabotaged to prevent him from winning the Democratic PArty nomination.

Maybe the entire episode is a call to all Americans to rethink politics, and to put the general welfare of all before the petty interests of serial con-artists, family firm politicians, and dodgy corporate heavyweights.

And in Ireland, the same setiments apply to the surge of institutional overdrive that is setting the context for an almighty orgy in politicisation of the state, which will ultimately end (as it always does) in national bankruptcy.

How politics operates has direct influence on how quickly the state it runs ends up bankrupt.

Deco, you are right, it always ends up in bankruptcy. At any rate, this was Crotty’s prediction for Ireland and in no small part to the role of the state (the other being land ownership), which is much more damaging in postcolonial countries. I recall reading something recently by Peter Hitchens about the politicization of the British civil service a few years ago.

I first heard of Kunstler here, either from Andy Mooney or yourself, and I always read his blog. It seems as if the world is divided into those who see *it* and those who don’t. Kunstler and Hitchens, for example, often arrive at similar conclusions from very different starting points. Their reactions were almost identical to the (latest) alleged Syrian gassing.

This short twitter exchange about the earlier gas attack between Hitchens and BBC’s Mark Urban, linked to from the former’s blog, is very revealing. As in so many things (from Savile to AGW to Tuam to the EU to Spanish history to mass immigration to Trump and on and on) when they are pressed for evidence there isn’t any and they change the subject:

RTE broadcast a programme on The Irish Sweepstake.
Corruption is nothing new.
However what is new (sort of) is the accumulative impact of institutional corruption over many decades.
It’s not the final straw that breaks the camels back, it’s the total weight of all the straws.

Why do you assume it was owned by a pensioner? You seem to have a fetish on duped pensioners. It could have been a refugee from a local or foreign war, or a farmer. It is quite possible for you to be laid waste by a disease or catastrophe and be killed.

How many pensioners have bought life annuities and given away a fortune for future cash flow only to die early and there is no residual? Why would you wish a reverse mortgage on a homeowner? There are many ways to be duped at any age.

Should something happen to you Adam your bitcoin is forever lost in cyberspace and gone forever never to be seen again. At least the discovered gold is demonstrating its immutability and preservation of wealth no matter how long before its rediscovery. There are thousands of coins lying all over Britain having been or waiting to be discovered. You will never find a bit coin as it is a figment of your imagination and does not exist. Neither does digital fiat phony money which is why there is an economic crisis unfolding. money, to function correctly needs to be a final settlement of debt and not an IOU. It needs to have intrinsic value or it is, worthless, masquerading as something of value because it has a digit printed, stamped or engraved thereon.

I doubt there will be any diving expedition to recover the bitcoin sunk below the waves in someones cellphone or computer. There will be yet more gold and silver coin recoveries from a past age.

Dreadful stuff Tony, at least do some basic research on what you are attempting to talk about.

First of all I never mentioned Bitcoin – you brought it up (again). I don’t shove Bitcoin down people’s throats – unlike the incorrigible goldbugs, who are legions and their minions (mostly duped pensioners).

If the next plane that I am on goes down in flames, my daughter will get all the value of my Bitcoins – they won’t be lost. It takes 5 minutes to set up such an arrangement if you know what you are doing.

I wouldn’t touch annuities with a barge pole either – another scam – just like ‘premium collector’s coins’.

Hoarding gold isn’t going to do shit for you or anyone else unless you put it to work for you.

(Victor Rothschild, 1910-1980, the famous “Fifth Man” of the Cambridge Five Spy Ring)

Reprise of key article:

INTRO
Here is proof that the Rothschild-controlledcentral banking cartel is behind Communism and world government tyranny.

“Which is more plausible? One of the richest men in the world, Victor Rothschild espoused Communist ideals so that his own fabulous wealth and position could be taken away? Or that Communism was in fact a deception designed to take away our wealth and freedom in the name of “equality” and “brotherhood”? ”

PREFACE BY HENRY MAKOW ;
Politicians are not our leaders. They represent the Rothschilds, who are Satanists. Thus when Theresa May has a majority and three more years in her mandate, we have to ask: What Is She Up To?

Correspondent Richard Alderley has a provocative answer:
“Brexit will never happen.” he says. “UK forces are already amalgamating with EUFOR [EU Army] and we are adopting all EU laws in to British law. Brexit is another State scam designed to mislead the public. It is cover for greater amalgamation with the EU beyond any State declaration. The British State is in its death throes…the election is purely a delaying action. Everyone knows State paedophilia is the modus operandi of the Establishment. I suspect Rothschild introduced it to the US government just as he used it to bribe the UK government.”

INTRO
Britain is facing another General Election on June 8th after having been promised that there would not be another one until 2020. So just what is going on?
The mainstream media will tell you that Prime Minister May is looking for a new mandate from the voting public to carry out the Brexit sham as she thinks fit.
It is clear that the long delayed Brexit will be held over until after the election, in fact it will actually be held over forever if Theresa May, the Queen and the Bank of England get their way.

Some Establishment shills like tax avoider Nigel Farage, will incorrectly suggest it is to avoid the expenses scandals where quite paltry sums ranging from a few hundred pounds sterling through to forty or fifty thousands of pounds sterling, have been misappropriated by our self seeking political class.
At no point will Establishment shill Farage suggest that ex Chancellor Osborne or crook ex Prime Minister Cameron should be prosecuted for illegally selling off the Royal Mail to their rich City friends for £1billion, (one billion pounds sterling), less that it was actually worth. Now that is a crime against the nation, but that is another story.

Every Establishment shill will jump out of the woodwork with their own version of what this is about, including such treasures as the destruction of the Labour Party, the prevention of Brexit by the Remainers (now commonly referred to as the Remoaners), and other unlikely stories.
None of them, however, will even hint at the truth. Not one will suggest the true reason. Since every single one of these people are complicit in the fraud that is taking place before your very eyes, no one will or dares to speak the truth (for fear of their lives)!

INTRO OF INTRO ;
On 18 April 2017, Theresa May’s decision to hold a General Election boosted the Pound.

This could mean that Theresa May is going to go for a ‘soft Brexit’?

EXCERPT
According to the Financial Times on 18 April 2017:

“The reaction in the currency market suggests investors are betting that in the event of a May victory, the prime minister will have a firmer hand when it comes to negotiating a soft Brexit in the face of hardline Tory Eurosceptics.”

Ultimately, there is only ONE candidate who can
- preserve the Euro in the medium term
- avoid France becomming another Italy
- sort out the youth unemployment problem
- change the direction of the EU away from underperformance and centralization, towards economic activity and autonomy
- prevent civil strife within France.

Unfortunately, that candidate is proven to be corrupt.

Only Fillon can stop Le Pen, because the other two have nothing to offer than has not already been tried mutliple times since Mitterand.

Macron has luke warm support, and a non-existent track record. Le Pen is divisive. Menanchon is Coppinger in a beret.

France actually needs Thatcherism. It has gone too far to the left. It is running out of money. If the election was in Germany, there would be argument in favour of moving to the left, to stop undermining southern European competitiveness.